Creative Juices gets flowing at KDU’s Comm-Code Mania Hunt 2011

A heart-throbbing moment – Participants look on as their final masterpiece is being judged by the industrial experts!

Aaron Goh, Head of KDU Penang’s Centre of Design Excellence, teaching the participants on how to create their very own 3D characters.

It was a Saturday for leisure and a charge for the creative brain juice as a total of 70 students from various Penang secondary schools such as Methodist Girls School, SMJK Jit Sin and SMJK Convent Datuk Keramat participated in the recently held Comm-Code Mania Hunt 2011.

Proudly organized by KDU College Penang's School of Mass Communication and Center of Design Excellence (CODE), this event aimed to encourage students to express their creative potentials and have a platform to cultivate their artistry, this works to reflect the characteristics of our next generation in the area of Mass Communication and Design and how KDU works to develop creativity and communication among its students to be the best in their fields. Participants of this activity also stood a chance to win attractive prizes such as iPod Shuffles and cash prizes.

The excited students were give a welcoming speech by the Business Development manager of the School of Arts and Social Sciences, Mr. Gerrard Boey before being guided through a brief workshop on how the competition works. The participants soon found out that they are to create a character and icon for the design and communication department of KDU Penang together with an advertising tagline to go with it. The character creation process was briefed by Mr. Aaron Goh, Academic Department Head of Center of Design Excellence (CODE) while the advertising tagline brainstorm session was conducted by Ms. Felicia Aw, Academic Department Head of Mass Communication.

Once the briefing was completed, the participants were split into teams of 4 with each team being tasked to design a 3 Dimensional character using boxes and then use paint to create the imagery of their character and pair it with a advertising tagline that consists of verbal slogans that relates to the elements of the local Penang culture. It was a challenging task for the participants but it was greeted with valor as with this competition, students were exposed to idea development processes and most importantly communication skills as they were required to discuss and decide on the direction of their design for the competition.

At the pinnacle of the event, all 18 teams came up with fantastic designs that were uniquely personalized and after going through a series of difficult judging by creative industry judges such as Mr. Lim Chun Woei who is the Founder of the company called 'Urban Creatures' as well as Mr. Chuah Kee Wooi who is the Creative Director of OCCA Events Design, it was finally time for the much coveted prize giving ceremony. The results of the competition were announced and it was sheer delight for SMJK Jit Sin as their students bagged all top 3 awards with team "Earth Garden" taking 2nd runner up spot winning KDU goodies, movie vouchers and RM100. 1st runner up went to team "Katy Sunny" where they took home KDU goodies, movie vouchers and RM 200. The title of Comm-Code Mania Hunt 2011 Champion meanwhile went to "Team Dear" winning KDU goodies, movie vouchers, RM 300 and an iPod shuffle each.

In the spirit of giving, all participants went home as winners as everyone received a certificate of participation for their efforts as well as KDU goodies. The event concluded with a photoshoot session with the winning teams and a group photo of everyone before everyone adjourned home. Here at KDU, we have the motto of People Inspire People and we hoped that with activities such as the Comm-Code Mania Hunt 2011, we will prevail in our effort to inspire artistry and communication amongst today's high school students who will grow up to be tomorrow's leaders in the creative industry.

For more information on the programmes and activities happening in KDU University College PJ, call 03-77288123 / email best@kdu.edu.my, or log on to their official website at www.kdu.edu.my.